


A Bridge that Just Won't Burn

by dandyqueen



Series: fire in the blood [3]
Category: The Last of Us, The Last of Us (Video Games)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Mutual Pining, Shameless Smut, but it's still smut, it's soft and lovely and a little sappy, oh look it's more sex with joel, you know how it goes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:08:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25944106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dandyqueen/pseuds/dandyqueen
Summary: Your third visit to Jackson is your last visit. This time, you're here to stay.(Can be read as a standalone if you're just looking for smut, but there's more smut if you read the rest of the series. Go read Slow Hand and Don't It Feel Good.)
Relationships: Joel (The Last of Us)/Original Female Character(s), Joel (The Last of Us)/Reader, Joel/Reader
Series: fire in the blood [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1861858
Comments: 11
Kudos: 117





	A Bridge that Just Won't Burn

**Author's Note:**

> So, here we are: part three. Whatever is Joel gonna do for you this go-round?
> 
> Imma let y’all guess this time.

You decide about ten miles outside of Jackson that you’re not going back to Nevada.

It’s not an easy decision to make by any means. Maria’s offer to accept everyone from your settlement into Jackson is unbelievably generous, but you can’t imagine that fifty-odd people will want to collectively pick up everything and travel all the way to Wyoming. Leaving Nevada means potentially leaving all of your friends - the people who have become your family - behind.

Leaving Nevada also means that you have to give up all of the authority you’ve enjoyed the past five years. You don’t mind that necessarily. It might be nice to simply exist without worrying about everyone’s safety, but you like that your people trust you. And, well, you helped found your settlement. You’ve poured your soul into making it work. It’s a lot to ask to give that up.

But you know that, even if you haven’t necessarily known Joel that long, you’ve got to go where your heart’s telling you to go. You’ve never been one to listen to your heart instead of your head, but you take it as a good sign that your head and your heart are in sync on this issue. So, while it’s a tough decision to make, it doesn’t take you long to make it.

It takes a long conversation with your second-in-command, a woman named Arla, to finally convince you that’s it’s going to be okay. If anyone deserves to voice their opinion, it’s her - she’s the reason you’re in Nevada anyway. She’s the one who convinced you to leave the Atlanta OZ to rebuild the settlement.

Arla’s standing nearly shoulder-to-shoulder with you as you walk in the opposite direction of Jackson. You’re leading the group - you have to since you’re the one who knows the path to Montana. She knows you better than anyone, and you know that she’s waiting for you to speak what’s on your mind. She’s always been notoriously bad at waiting, though.

“No one’s going to blame you for staying in Jackson,” Arla says, and pauses before saying, “except for yourself, knowing you.”

“We rebuilt Winnemucca from the ground up,” you reply, sighing. You kick a lump of ice away from your boot. You should probably help her hack away the vegetation obscuring the path, but you’re oddly drained even after a good night’s sleep. “Five years of hard work is a lot to give up for someone I barely know.”

“Yeah, it’s a lot to ask,” Arla agrees. She’s been hacking at vegetation obscuring the path with her machete from the time they left Jackson. It’s rough work. You should _definitely_ be helping. “But, look, we might not even make it back to Jackson if the infected have their say. You know just as well as I do that every day is a gift. I don’t think you should look a gift horse in the mouth.”

She’s right. You _know_ she’s right. (She’s always fucking right.) You’ve heard her whole spiel before, but you’re actually listening this time.

“You know Maria invited all of us to stay,” you reply, skating right over what you know is the wisdom behind her words. “Convincing people to up and leave is gonna cause some problems.”

There’s not many people left in your settlement. You have half of them with you now, and it’s only fifteen people. It used to be closer to fifty, but as is the natural order of things, people have died and people have left. Hell, you’re headed to Montana to meet a the group that left a year ago because you have an agreement to trade.

“Yeah, it will,” she says. “But there’s not many of us left, and that desert is _hot_. Besides, we’d all follow you anywhere. I’m certainly staying in Jackson if you do.”

You finally take out your own machete to help. You’re trying to get back on the main road, but the forest around Jackson seems adamant to keep you there by way of massively overgrown vegetation. You’ve gotten used to cacti, lizards, and sand, so the greenery is almost shocking.

“I won’t be in charge in Jackson, though,” you warn. “And neither will you. Maria runs things differently than we do.”

Arla shrugs, as if that’s the last thing on her mind. “Wouldn’t mind taking a break, personally. And it seems like Jackson runs well.”

You agree. “Seems like it.”

You walk in silence for a while, focusing on the path in front of you. Arla’s boots crunch over the ice, and you have to wonder if you can get used to the snow. You’ve never lived in a place that snows before, not even before the outbreak. Before the outbreak, it was swampland and steaming cities. Now, it’s the aforementioned desert. Ice and snow is different on a level you can barely articulate – clean and oppressive all at once.

“You know, most of us in the group want to stay in Jackson anyway,” Arla says quietly after a while. She keeps her voice down so the group behind her can’t hear. “We talked about it yesterday.”

You sigh. You can’t blame her for talking about it without you; your answer probably would have been different yesterday before Maria asked. Still, you’d have liked to have been included. “Why didn’t you come get me if y’all were talking about it?”

“Please, like any of us wanted to bother you,” Arla snorts. “We’re all just glad you finally went home with someone.”

You roll your eyes. “I’m glad my sex life was a topic of discussion amongst you.”

“What sex life? This is, what, the first person you’ve been with in the last five years? Hell, I've known you since we were six years old, and I barely have any other examples.”

“Thank you, really, your summation of my personal life gives me great joy.”

"I'm not pickin' at you. Much." Arla nudges your shoulder. “You had us worried when you didn’t come back to the dorms that fourth night.”

“Oh, whatever.” You hack at a particularly stubborn shrub. “Y’all’ve been at that bar the whole week.”

“No, seriously,” Arla says. “I almost went out to look for you until I remembered where you got that guitar.”

You sheath your machete. The path in front of you is clear enough now that you’re back on the main road outside of Jackson.

“I really miss my guitar.”

* * *

You're standing in Maria's office, having been escorted there by the guards watching Jackson's front gate. This time, it was marginally easier to get in - seems they were expecting your group to come through.

“Got an answer for me?” Maria asks, leaning against her desk. There’s a map unfurled on the desktop, marked up with routes through the thick forest and plans you don’t even want to try to understand.

Maria is intimidating. Smart. Calculated. No wonder she’s been in charge for so long. You respect that.

You nod. The words get stuck in your throat for a second, but you manage to get them out. “I want to stay.”

“Good,” Maria sighs, low and almost imperceptible, but you catch it. “And the rest of your group?”

You talked about it with your group over the course of the last month as you headed towards Montana. They want to stay as well, but it’ll take another month to pack up the settlement, convince everyone to leave, and get them all packed up and back to Wyoming.

“We’ll have to make contact with the rest of the settlement back in Nevada, but those of us who are here would also like to stay.” You cross your arms and wish you had a chair to sit down in. “I figure that we’ll rest here for a couple of days, then make our way back down to the rest of our group.”

Arla nudges your arm - she’d come with you to Maria’s office to offer some moral support (and probably to keep you from backing out, though you’re absolutely sure that wouldn’t have been a problem anyway). “You stay here - I’ll bring your stuff back up with me.”

You _didn’t_ talk about that. You’re quite sure Arla’s trying to get Maria on her side.

“I can’t do that,” you reply. It’s too much to ask of Arla, no matter how long you’ve been friends. “They’re my people, too. I have to be there.”

“You absolutely _can_ do that, and I think you should stay here and rest.” Arla shakes her head. “The only person blaming you is yourself. You understand that, right?”

You press your fingers to your temples, shaking your head. No reason to bring Maria into this. “We’ll talk about this later.”

Maria’s been part of the same conversation before. She’ll let you two duke it out between yourselves, but not here in her office. “Well, you let me know what you decide to do. I can send you along with some help if need be.”

“That’s too much, Maria-”

“No, it’s not,” she replies, with finality. “You let me know, and we’ll make it work.”

You bite your lip. You’ve never been accustomed to help, even before the outbreak. Finally, you nod. “Okay.”

“I’ve got y’all a place set up already. It’s closer to the edge of town that I’d like, but it’s the best available space right now.” Maria pauses. “Wasn’t trying to be presumptuous - just hopeful. And prepared.”

You really don’t know what to say to that – your brain has gone a little fuzzy. You didn’t even know Jackson was that spacious.

“I’d expect about thirty people in all,” Arla replies when you don’t.

“I figured,” Maria says. “I overheard some of your group-”

Before Maria had finished her sentence, there was a short, rapt knock on the door. Joel poked his head through the door when Maria called for him to come in. He glances from Maria, to Arla, to you, and finally back to Maria. It’s unspoken that he’s already heard your group is back, and Maria nods at him to confirm what he doesn’t want to vocalize.

“Arla, if you’ll stay here, we’ll talk business,” Maria says. She nods at you. “Joel’s gonna show you where you’ll be.”

“Alright,” you nod and follow Joel out of Maria’s office.

Once the pair of you are out of sight and earshot, Joel pulls you into a hug. He’s bundled up in a dark leather jacket and scarf, and he’s so warm compared to everything around you. You love that he’s so solid under your touch, and even that you can’t get to the muscle underneath, you can still feel the muscles in his back shift. You stay there, unwilling to move and uncaring as to anyone who might round the corner and see. It’s simply good to be there.

“Welcome back,” Joel mumbles in your ear, and, oh, that _voice_. You dream of that voice. You’ve _been dreaming_ of that voice to the point where you’re almost embarrassed. He pulls back, and you almost grab him again, but there’ll be more than enough time for that later.

Joel leads you outside to the streets of Jackson, back into the freezing winter air where you definitely don’t want to go. “How was Montana?”

“Didn’t go as planned, but we still got what we needed,” you say. You step in line next to him, struggling to keep up because he’s quite a bit taller than you. “What about you? Everything okay?”

“So far, so good,” Joel says, and it seems to be the truth. He’s not limping quite so much now, and the scars peeking out from his hairline have gotten less red and angry. “Maria’s lettin’ me out on patrols again.”

“Feelin’ a little less stir-crazy?” you ask. He seems like the type to go nutty when he’s cooped up. You can sympathize with being a busybody.

“Gettin’ there,” he chuckles.

You walk in silence for a while, just enjoying the morning. Jackson really is beautiful, you think, all covered in snow and ice like a collection of gingerbread houses. There’s not a lot of people out since it’s still early in the morning, but you can imagine it’ll get crowded soon.

Joel lets you loop your arm through his as you walk. It’s nice being close to him, especially after being gone for a month, but you’re definitely, unashamedly using him as a heat lamp right now. The way he smiles lets you know he thinks it’s funny.

“This is it.” He stops you two streets down from the courthouse in front of a full block of homes. They’re small, neat homes, clean and uncluttered. Every building is covered in snow that’s entirely untouched, like no one lives on the street yet. “We finished them up this week.”

You step forward, letting go of Joel’s arm. You cross your arms to retain some of the heat. “This is perfect.”

“Well, we’ve been working on this block for a long time,” he says, and remember that he used to be a carpenter. “It’ll be nice to see it put to good use.”

He doesn’t say it’ll be your group putting them to good use, but he doesn’t have to say it. You know what he means.

Joel walks you back to the courthouse to meet with Maria. He stops out in front, looking up at the squat little building. There’s something on his mind, so you wait for him to say whatever he’s going to say.

“I’m sure you’re gonna want to talk to your group,” he says. “But, uh, if you finish up… Ellie and her girlfriend are coming for dinner and movie night if you want to…”

You’ve literally had his dick in your mouth, but he’s flustered asking you to come to dinner? Your heart clenches in your chest. “I would love that.”

“Right, uh, good,” he says, and you can see him biting back a smile. “And if you need an extra hand going back to Nevada, I’d be happy to come along.”

Now, that was unexpected. You have to step up on your tiptoes to kiss him, and you do it right in the middle of the street.

“I’d love that, too.”

* * *

You’ve been at Joel’s house for well over an hour, having walked over immediately after talking things out with your group and getting cleaned up. Your group seems pleased by the living situation here in Jackson, and that eases your mind quite a bit.

Dinner’s been ready for half an hour by the time Ellie and Dina arrive. You’ve been helping Joel get the food ready to the best of your ability, which, eventually, ends up with you acting as the prep person because you’re a terrible fuckin’ cook. (But you try to be helpful, and that’s what matters.)

Which means that you’ve got a nice half-hour to enjoy each other’s company. There’s a lot you could do in that half hour. There’s a lot you’d _like_ to do in that half-hour (mainly, Joel). But you have all night for that. This half-hour consists of nothing more strenuous than sitting on Joel’s front porch, telling him about the past month’s journey up north. Sitting on his porch, just talking, might be the easiest thing you’ve ever done.

Finally, Ellie and Dina walk up, and you head inside for dinner. As always, Joel’s food is perfect (with no help from you), and you inhale it with true voracity. A month of eating dry rations and whatever you can find means that in the face of real food, manners pretty much go right out the window.

You don’t ask for the story because everyone deserves their privacy, but you get it anyway. Dina’s the one who tells you while Ellie sits there red-faced. She tells you that it’s always been Ellie, but before Ellie, there was Jesse. You laugh because Ellie’s so obviously embarrassed, and because Joel doesn’t mind picking at her about it.

You like Dina just as much as you like Ellie.

Once everyone is full and the kitchen is clean, it’s movie time. This might be the part of the night that excites you the most – _movies_. Ellie picks the movie, and it’s something that you vaguely remember seeing right before the outbreak. There are giant robots beating the shit out of each other, and you kind of love it.

It’s late when Ellie and Dina leave. Dina falls asleep less than an hour into the movie, which is completely understandable being that she’s pretty far along. Ellie shakes her awake, and they leave with the promise of stopping by tomorrow after Dina’s doctor’s appointment. Ellie hugs Joel on the way out, and, to your surprise, she hugs you, too.

Once they’re gone, you lean back against Joel. You could go to sleep right here, using Joel as your makeshift pillow. By the way he yawns, you guess that he probably feels the same about you.

“Wanna finish the movie?” Joel asks, and he sounds like he’s more than okay if you don’t want to.

You do, actually, want to finish the movie. It’s been twenty-five years since you’ve seen this movie. It’s been so long that you don’t even remember how it ends. You tell him as much and lay there smushed against his side until the movie finally ends.

Once it’s over, you stand up and stretch. Joel’s almost fallen asleep himself, and he’s spent the last twenty minutes with his head resting on top of yours. He shakes himself awake and gets up to turn the TV off.

It’s been a long day, and even through you cleaned up before you walked over to Joel’s, you could do with a shower. This gives you an idea.

“Feel like a shower?”

Joel nods, eyebrows raised. “I could do with a shower.”

* * *

You think this might be the best night you’ve had since the outbreak. Hell, this might be the best night you’ve ever had. You get to have a nice, hot shower in a nice, comfortable home, complete with a hot naked man who you kind-of-sort-of-might-be a little bit in love with, good food - even _a movie_. You don’t care about anything else as long as you can have more nights like this one. You’ll do whatever Maria asks, whatever you have to do.

In what seems to be a burgeoning trend, you leave your clothes wherever – somewhere in the ether of the house, misplaced, unnecessary, and forgotten (at the top of the stairs). Joel’s not so quick to leave his clothes out and about (you get the feeling Ellie must have been teasing him after last time). You climb in the shower before he even gets to the bathroom.

You let the hot water run down over you while Joel gets undressed. He laughs when he catches you peeking out from behind the shower curtain to watch, but you definitely don’t stop peeking. Joel is delicious and watching him undress is fucking spectacular.

You wait until he climbs in with you to start soaping yourself up. After you shampoo your hair, you make him lean over so you can do the same for him. Lucky him – his hair still thick; it’s gotten really long, and you’re kind of into it. He holds onto your hips while you massage the shampoo into his hair, sighing occasionally as your fingertips drag along his scalp. He’d go to sleep standing up right here if he could.

You help him rinse his hair, and once all the soap is washed away, you wrap your arms around his neck. “You remember the first night I was here?”

“It’s kind of hard to forget,” he replies. He rests his hands on the small of your back, and you’re immediately distracted by how big his hands are.

It’s almost on impulse what you decide to do next, but it’s definitely the best idea you’ve had all day. You nudge him until his back hits the cold tile (you feel bad about that, but he’s gonna get warmed up pretty quick). He flinches away from the tile, and you catch the shift of muscle cording his neck.

You reach up on your tiptoes to press a kiss to his chapped lips. “If I remember correctly, you didn’t let me finish.”

“I definitely remember you finishing,” Joel replies, and, oh, the way his voice drops makes every part of you heat up.

“Oh, you do?” you ask, laughing in his ear.

“Pretty sure I did that,” he teases, but his grip on your hips is anything but teasing.

“Well, you’d be correct.” You slide your hands down his chest and over his stomach. “I mean, you didn’t let me finish you.”

It takes a second, but Joel catches on, and the way his face turns red makes you downright giddy. “It, uh, might take me a minute-”

“I told you this the first time, and I’ll tell you again,” you say, kissing his cheek, his neck, right down to his collarbone, “we got all night, darlin’.”

You kiss your way down his chest, over his stomach, until you drop to your knees so you can lick your way down from his navel. You make sure to keep your eyes trained on his face so you can watch his reactions, and, boy, are they fantastic. He can’t quite make himself look down; instead, he leans his head back against the tile and looks up like he’s praying. You squeeze his thighs - a gentle reminder that you’re far more interesting to look at than the bathroom ceiling.

When you take him in your mouth, he rests his hand on the back of your head. No pressure, not tangling in your hair, just resting there. You slide your hand up his stomach, squeezing his hips as you move. He catches your hand and holds it against his chest while you lick a slow path along the shaft of his cock. You add your hand - the one that’s not already occupied - and drag your fingers along behind your mouth, twisting as you go.

It’s after the second twist of your hand that he makes a strangled sound in the back of his throat, somewhere between a moan and the beginnings of the word _please_. You’ve definitely never heard him make _that_ sound before, and it sends an urgent jolt of _need_ right down to the base of your spine. He squeezes your hand against his chest, leaning his head back against the tile, and says, “God _damn_ , girl-”

You look up and pause just long enough to ask, “Doin’ okay up there?”

The laugh he gives you in response is cut off by another breathless sound. You hollow out your cheeks and suck him down to the root, and the low groan he makes sounds downright _tortured_. “You’re killin’ me, honey.”

You don’t reply to that, but you’re pretty pleased with yourself. It takes a whole hell of a lot of concentration not to smile around him, but you don’t want to break the rhythm that you’ve established. His grip on your hand is making your fingers go numb, but you don’t dare pull away. Instead, you wrap your tongue around the shaft of his cock and keep with the pace you’ve set.

You can tell he’s close (and thank goodness he is - your knees are screaming) because he’s tangling his fingers in your hair and twitching in your mouth like he’s still trying to hold out. Thankfully, he’s not a hair-puller and he’s not trying to take over - he just lets you do what you want and takes the time to enjoy. The muscles cording his thighs tense up like he’s fighting to stay upright. He taps your shoulder to let you know he’s done, but you don’t pull back.

“Come on, baby - hold on -” Joel’s finally caught on that you’re not going to stop, so he pulls back. It only takes him a couple of strokes before he’s spilling into his hand while you look up at him from between your eyelashes. “ _Shit_ -”

Once he’s come down, Joel helps you up, though he’s having trouble staying steady on his feet. Time to get cleaned up again. He guides you back under the spray and kisses you, sliding his hands over every inch of you he can reach. Once you’re done, you reach back and turn off the spray, clinging to him for warmth.

“Ready for bed?” you ask, like you’ve got another bright idea.

Joel rolls his eyes, and you notice the dark circles under his eyes. But he grins, and yeah, you’re definitely a little bit in love. “Yes, ma’am.”

You climb out of the shower to dry off, which you gladly let Joel do for you. This is the first time that Joel doesn’t bother to put his clothes back on, much to your pleasure. You don’t either. He leads you to bed without actually letting go of you, guiding you to lay on your side before he slides in next to you.

Joel said he’d need a minute, but you don’t seem to have much of a problem getting him worked up again.

Every movement he makes is gentle, soft, with an underlying hint of urgency that he’s trying not to show. You meet him with the same urgency, wrapping your arms around his middle and dragging him close so that his chest is pressed to yours. You think this is the most handsy he’s ever been, and you really, _really_ like it. He makes a show out of dragging his fingertips down your back, over your hips, down to clasp your thighs and coach you to throw your leg over his hip. He cradles the back of your head and brings you in for a kiss that’s basically just teeth and tongue, hot enough to have you grinding against his naked thigh.

Still cradling your head in one hand, he brings the other up to splay across your stomach. You can feel every callus on his hand - the ones from playing guitar, the ones from carving wood and lifting things he shouldn’t, the ones from holding a knife in his hand more skillfully than any butcher. From there, he drags his hand down to the space between your thighs, catching your clit underneath his thumb. He never applies pressure, never holds you in place, but you find that the gentleness of his hands make you ache like you might die without his touch.

In stark contrast to the ease of his movements and the deftness of his fingers, his words are sharp enough to cut straight through you. If you’d never heard him make the noises he made in the shower, never heard his voice drop to something this low and dark, you’ve definitely never heard him talk like this. He barely raises his voice above a whisper, but the low rumble in his chest is perfectly, flawlessly clear.

“Look at that,” Joel says, shifting his thigh against you. His thumb teases the lightest of circles against your clit. “Already wet for me.”

You don’t respond because your brain short-circuits. You twitch against his hand for some kind of friction, but that just makes him pull back.

“Uh-uh, hold still,” he says before resuming the soft circles and shifting his thigh some against you. It’s not enough to provide any relief; in fact, it does the opposite. The soft slide of his skin against you sends an overwhelming wave of heat rolling through you. “Didn’t take much, did it?”

“Not when you look like this, no,” you manage to respond this time.

“That right?” This time he presses his lips to your forehead and holds you there, still working you in those slow, soft circles. “You think about me?”

“Yeah,” you reply, stretching up to kiss him. He doesn’t kiss you back – just smiles against your lips like he’s teasing you. “Missed you.” 

He finally dips a finger in, working you until you’re loose and slick. You grind against his hand, and this time, he lets you. He doesn’t respond to the _missed you_ part, though, but you feel his breath quicken against your lips when you say it. “What did you think about?”

You squinch your eyes shut. “ _Joel_ -”

“Eyes on me, honey,” he says, and it’s so, so gentle that you can’t help the moan that escapes your lips. “What did you think about?”

“Your - _ah_ \- your voice.”

You feel him pause rather than see him, like he wasn’t expecting you to respond that way. It’s an almost imperceptible break but for the fact that he’s got two fingers in you now. “My voice?”

You nod, and you have to grab his wrist when he starts crooking his fingers inside you. “The way you say my name.”

There’s something in his voice now, something that’s not just heat and urgency. “You think about it a lot?”

“Yeah,” you reply, and your voice shakes. He’s found the spot that makes you shudder against him, and he doesn’t let up when he finds it. You’d have shoved your face in the pillow if he weren’t still cradling your head. “Every day.”

That seems to be the breaking point. Joel kisses your forehead again, lips lingering there, until he presses his forehead to yours. He shifts so that your leg is hitched up higher over his hip. “I missed you, too.”

It makes your heart ache when he says that – it leaves you burning like you’ve been struck by lightning. You’d ask why he missed you, but it doesn’t quite seem like the time for that. Instead, you wrap your arm around his back, nails scratching at his skin, and kiss him. 

Joel’s not quite done, though. He pulls back, still pumping his fingers, and _fuck_ if it’s not downright agonizing now. “You ready?”

“ _Fuck_ \- yes-”

He pulls his fingers out, but keeps his thumb pressed to your clit. “You want it like this or-”

“Joel, _please_ just fuck me.”

He chuckles in your ear, hooking your knee up into the crook of his elbow to give him a better angle. “Yes, ma’am.”

Joel slides himself in nice and easy until he’s fully seated. You’ve become accustomed to his slow, thorough pace, but it seems like he’s not interested in going slow this time. Oh, no, this time Joel doesn’t waste time teasing you with slow, calculated thrusts. He slips back out and drives in, not necessarily quick but deep and rough, keeping you pressed against him and spread wide with your knee hooked over his forearm.

You scratch at his back, clutching him to you. The muscles in his back shift, tense and hard, from the effort of driving up into you. It’s one of the many things that drive you nuts – that he’s solid and broad. You run your hands along his bicep, skin taut over the thick muscle, and over his chest. You take his face in your hands, kissing him, unwilling to let him pull away again.

Joel does have to pull away, though, and gasps for air when he does. He rolls his hips and hits _something_ that damn near makes you draw blood when you bite your bottom lip. “How’s that, darlin’?”

“ _Christ_ , Joel-”

He catches the desperation in your voice and does it again, pulling a rough whimper from you. His voice is low and sweet when he asks, “Feel good?”

“ _Yes_ -”

Joel flips you onto your back and wedges himself back between your thighs. He coaches you to drape your legs over his shoulders, and when he leans back over you, the sheer breadth of his shoulders keeps your legs eagled around him. He rolls his hips with that punishing pace and takes one of your breasts in his hand, pinching and massaging your nipple until your cunt’s clenching around his cock.

His voice in your ear is really what does you in. It doesn’t matter what he’s doing - that his pace is rough and deep, that your thighs are starting to burn, that you’re so close and overstimulated and losing it just listening to the soft wet noises every time he thrusts back in. When he murmurs in your ear, he’s gentle and sweet with his rumbling voice, telling you how good you feel around him, how soft and wet you are for him, how much he’s missed you. 

It’s his soft demand of, “Come for me, honey,” that sends you reeling.

The sharp flutter of your cunt clenching around him sends Joel reeling right after you. He tucks his face in the crook of your neck, burying his cock deep in you as he comes.

It takes you both a few minutes to recover. Once Joel’s caught his breath, he extricates himself from your grip to go get a washcloth to clean you both up. After you’re cleaned up, he climbs back into bed with you, burrowing under the covers (because it’s even colder than the last time you were here - if that’s even possible).

Joel rolls onto his side, drawing you against his chest. His chin rests on top of your head, strong arms keeping you close. Amazingly, this time he doesn’t grab his clothes. He seems to have resigned himself to sleeping without them in favor of using you as a heat source. You are more than okay with this.

“You okay?” he asks, and he sounds so tired. It’s cute. “Wasn’t too rough, was I?”

“Not at all.” You brush your lips along the line of his jaw. “But I won’t be moving from this spot for a while.”

“Sounds like a plan,” he says, grinning and dipping his head to kiss you. 

You think you made the right choice to stay in Jackson.

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, this is officially the end for fire in the blood. I wouldn’t completely rule out some drabbles here and there if I get the itch to write some mindless smut, but I’ll collect those in a part four if I decide to do that.
> 
> Like I mentioned in one of the other parts, I’m working on a Joel/OC story with a real, defined main character and story that has nothing to do with fire in the blood. I’ll start posting that in the next couple of weeks - probably sooner than later.
> 
> Anywho! Thank y’all for the sweet comments and the support!


End file.
